Biodiversity is collapsing worldwide. Here's why.

In this Our Changing Climate environmental video essay, we look at how climate change is causing a decrease in biodiversity worldwide. Biodiversity is a measure of the variety and variability of life, and climate change is causing the decline of biodiversity in numerous ecosystems via extreme weather, sea-level rise, and habitat destruction. Biodiversity matters because without such a variety of life and species, ecosystems begin to collapse ultimately affecting the livelihoods of communities reliant on healthy, biodiverse ecosystems. Biodiversity loss caused by climate change ultimately means species extinctions and a disconnect between animals and plants.

The script for this video was written by NCSE Graduate Student Outreach Fellows Cat Henry and DJ Kast.

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Resources:
1. Pyke, G.H., J.D. Thompson, D.W. Inouye, and T.J. Miller. 2016. Effects of climate change on phenologies and distributions of bumble bees and the plants they visit. Ecosphere 7(3):e01267.
2. Inouye, D. W. Effects of climate change on alpine plants and their pollinators. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 1–12 (2019). doi:10.1111/nyas.14104
3. Bellard, C., Bertelsmeier, C., Leadley, P., Thuiller, W. & Courchamp, F. Impacts of climate change on the future of biodiversity. Ecol. Lett. 15, 365–377 (2012).
4. Potts, S. G. et al. Global pollinator declines: Trends, impacts and drivers. Trends Ecol. Evol. 25, 345–353 (2010).
5. Willis, K. J., & Bhagwat, S. A. (2009). Biodiversity and climate change. Science, 326(5954), 806-807.
6. Williams, R. J., Bradstock, R. A., Cary, G. J., Enright, N. J., Gill, A. M., Leidloff, A. C., ... & Clarke, P. J. (2009). Interactions between climate change, fire regimes and biodiversity in Australia: a preliminary assessment.
7. Lavergne, S., Mouquet, N., Thuiller, W., & Ronce, O. (2010). Biodiversity and climate change: integrating evolutionary and ecological responses of species and communities. Annual review of ecology, evolution, and systematics, 41, 321-350.
11. Bellard, C., Bertelsmeier, C., Leadley, P., Thuiller, W. & Courchamp, F. Impacts of climate change on the future of biodiversity. Ecol. Lett. 15, 365–377 (2012).
12. Bartomeus, I. et al. Biodiversity ensures plant-pollinator phenological synchrony against climate change. Ecol. Lett. 16, 1331–1338 (2013).
13. Senapathi, D., Goddard, M. A., Kunin, W. E. & Baldock, K. C. R. Landscape impacts on pollinator communities in temperate systems: evidence and knowledge gaps. Funct. Ecol. 31, 26–37 (2017).

#Biodiversity #ClimateChange #Extinction

[OurChangingClimate]

Have you been involved in any restoration or preservation projects? Have you heard of any endangered or extinct species where you live?

[holleey]

bio diversity should be the primary metric for success rather than financial profit

[QuestForEco]

I hope more people realise the magnitude of impact created by our actions! We need to stop thinking and living like we're the only species in the world!

[verylongname]

Tired of all this covid stuff and nice to see some good content

[LTEKNIGHT]

Hey Charlie,
I was wondering what did you major in? Is it related to climate change or something totally different?

I'm a musicology major, but videos like yours motivate me to learn more about our changing climate.


Thanks for all the effort you put into making these videos!
Cheers

[rhiannn]

Have you guys seen the documentary 2040? One of their solutions really peaked my interest. Seaweed permaculture. Grows 1 metre a day, absorbs more CO2 than trees, doesn't require watering and nutritionally rich. Not to mention farms in the ocean will generate habitat for many fish. If I'm not wrong research on seaweed permaculture is currently being done in a university in Australia.

Stuff like this makes me really hopeful for the future. That is, only if people are willing to eat seaweed, though.

[ecoclubglobal]

Thank you for sharing this! As scary as all these facts maybe, it is important to keep learning and keep trying to be better

[syrahpoole]

Thank you for including your sources! Extremely useful in writing my own papers and validating statistics

[aldwyncalaguing]

The video is pleasing visually and more importantly, moving and informing in a manner that different types of audiene will surely understand the concepts and advocacy. Well done!

[danielibarra]

Great video! I live in Mexico City and have a small urban food forest, it has some biodiversity mainly bees, birds, butterflies and smaller insects.

[LogicGated]

Really sad to see the effects of our actions on other species.

[MultiDiscoMonkey]

I've been subscribed to your channel since the early days and it's so exciting to see that you're this close to a quarter of a million subs! The quality of your content speaks for itself.

[livingthezombielife]

Thank you for blessing this day with your video.

[benjamin]

This channel is an odd one. On one hand, I really enjoy the educational part, and I appreciate the effort to inform individuals. On the other hand, it is SUPER fucking depressing see all of this awful shit happen and feeling more or less helpless.

[Underoverrated]

Hello there! Do you take video suggestions? If so, I'd love your take on the following: evolutions in packaging, your post COVID predictions on how brands may start to be more eco (and those who look primed to do so), meat shortages / oil demand decrease and other COVID / eco trends, more brand analysis in general - I love those videos of yours. Aesop skincare would be interesting to look at. Thanks!

[vanessaroldan]

Hi Charlie! I finally mustered up the motivation to become a patreon subscriber. I hope to become reemployeed after the pandemic to upgrade my subscription. Thank you for always keeping me up to date in not only the issues that concern our environment but possible solutions. Cheers!

[vivekvs]

We have founded an organization to promote biodiversity in India without accepting any funds from businesses and government. It's really tough to convince people and draw attention to the importance of biodiversity for human survival. Almost all our efforts to promote agrobiodiversity and land use might experience a set back. It's because in this rush to create more activity in the system government might loosen the existing regulations. We are closely watching the governments structural reforms in this matter. Anyways thanks for asking about our involvement. Good content by the way. Appreciated!

[pierre-loupdurand]

Great work Charlie! I'm glad to see this video was made in collaboration with the NCSE. Your content is worthy of being used for education for all ages and can have a significant impact. Keep at it!

[adamspencer]

I've seen a lot of Eco-minded people say that we all need to live closer to the land and be with nature, but cities are, when built, designed, powered, and operated properly are far less environmentally damaging then living in the countryside. I live in Ottawa Canada and the city is surrounded by wetlands, the city has acknowledged that these critical ecosystems need to be protected and as such city counsel is voting on locking the urban boundary and slowly intensifying the urban landscape. It should also be said that Canadian cities often include more green space then other cities in North America, often having greenbelts too. Ottawa has been rapidly expanding it's city composting program recently as well for use in privet gardens and public parks
I don't know if you've done a video on cities effects on climate change but I think it should be a video you should consider.

[toekkababy]

There is no way out of this ecocrisis unless we reduce population 10fold at least starting yesterday